That is why, after all, we have maintained our call for all marriage supporters worldwide to do just that: Dump Starbucks for its corporate intolerance toward those who hold the basic and common sense belief in marriage as the union between one man and one woman, and to instead buy their coffee elsewhere. Maybe those marriage supporters in California will want to give Dumb Starbucks a try instead? Send us your pics if you do!

Did you know that Starbucks was recently reported to be perceived as the most LGBT-friendly brand in the U.S.? JCPenney, Target, Apple and Amazon round out the top five.

If you've been following the national marriage battle over the past 18 months this should come as no surprise. Starbucks has said that gay ‘marriage’ is one of its corporate values. Amazon founder Jeff Bezos, who recently purchased the Washington Post, gave hundreds of thousands of dollars of his own money to redefine marriage in Washington State. Target and JC Penny both support gay ‘marriage’ and the homosexual lifestyle in general, as does Apple.

In the same survey, it was reported that 75% of LGBT respondents said they were actively boycotting Chick-fil-A.

We only vote at a ballot box once a year at most. But we vote with our wallets every day. That’s why NOM maintains its Corporate Fairness Project - which includes the Dump Starbucks, Dump General Mills, and Thank Chick-fil-A initiatives – to inform you of what companies are taking active stands in the marriage battle, and where your money is best spent in defense of this sacred institution.

General Mills is pushing its marriage redefinition agenda even further, this time using a fictional character to assist. General Mills' culinary "spokeswoman" Betty Crocker decided to take time away from her baking to weigh in on the marriage debate in Minnesota:

If you haven't made the Dump General Mills pledge, please take two minutes to join the 26,000 others who have already done so!

Last week we surpassed 24,000 signatures on the DumpGeneralMills.com website! Will you forward this email to a friend and help us hit 25,000?

Since announcing their opposition to the Minnesota marriage amendment, General Mills has been pretty quiet on the issue of marriage. Apparently, they are content to have said their piece and to have allowed detractors to use their name and prestige to oppose the amendment, while sitting quietly on the side hoping that the furor will die off. That may soon begin to change.

General Mills has launched a new website, in cooperation with America Online and Everyday Health, hosted and staffed by the liberal Huffington Post news site. General Mills' new website, called Live Better America, will offer what you might expect: recipes, nutrition and healthy eating tips from General Mills designed to appear "authentic" (read: "we want readers to believe these are real articles, not an advertising effort designed to boost our sales and products").

Why would a company do this? The Minneapolis St. Paul Business Journal asked that very question of General Mills. The response was that General Mills wanted to expand beyond food into lifestyle issues. The General Mills blog gives additional information that should give us pause: in addition to things like recipes, healthy eating, fitness and diet and nutrition—things you would expect a food company to cover—the site will cover mind and body issues and relationships. Look for these lifestyle, mind and body, and relationship articles to start off in a very benign manner (who thinks we don't need a little more exercise?), but expect before long a transition into a renewed effort pushing for the redefinition of marriage and family in subtle and not so subtle ways.

What does this mean for us? Our campaign targeting General Mills' meddling in this contentious and highly important issue is not even close to being over! We need to keep up the pressure and let the company know that consumers will not tolerate being made pawns in General Mills' political games.

What you can do this week!

Did you and your friends participate in last Wednesday's Chick-fil-A Appreciation Day? Forward this newsletter along to those you know who supported Dan Cathy's brave stand for marriage, and ask these friends to join you in protesting General Mills' out-of-touch position pushing the redefinition of marriage.

Welcome! Thank you so much for taking the DumpGeneralMills.com pledge. You and more than 23,000 other Americans are standing up to General Mills and letting them know we think they should be selling cereal—not pushing gay marriage! Your help in sending this important message is greatly appreciated!

I'm Jonathan Baker, head of the National Organization for Marriage's Corporate Fairness Project. We launched the DumpGeneralMills.com campaign so that you, as an individual consumer, could join thousands of your fellow marriage supporters in telling General Mills to back off from their assault on marriage. Individually we may not have much influence; but together we can make our support for marriage heard.

With your permission, I'd like to share with you the latest developments in this campaign, recent news items and stories from people like you who are making their voices heard. (You can opt out of these news updates anytime you like—simply go to the bottom of any of our emails and click unsubscribe.)

Supporting and defending marriage is a joint effort: we cannot do this alone. We need your help to spread the word to your friends, family, and community. Toward this end, we will include in each newsletter one idea of an easy action that you can take to spread the word of the DumpGeneralMills.com protest.

Let me share with you part of the story of one DumpGeneralMills.com supporter who has joined her fellow citizens in protesting outside General Mills' corporate headquarters. Her full letter was published in the Minnesota Star Tribune.

Recently, I was one of the many protesters outside the General Mills corporate offices and spoke to the company's vice president of communications. I asked why a company like his would ever come out with a statement against the marriage amendment. His response was that the issue had been thought about for some time. My view is that when the media asked the company to state its position on this issue quite often, then monthly, then weekly, the company succumbed to the pressure and made this uninformed statement.

...So many people in this democracy believe in the strong foundation of a marriage between a man and a woman; it is incomprehensible that a large company that markets many of its products to children would choose this position.

A company should be interested in a good product and sales. It can make all the cereals and products it wants, but if there are no buyers, it will fail. General Mills, please choose mother, father, children in the future.

What you can do to help:

Tell your spouse, your children, or your best friend about how General Mills is opposing traditional marriage, and encourage them to join you in signing the DumpGeneralMills.com pledge.

Thank you so much again for caring about God's vision of marriage! We look forward to your continuing help in our work to support marriage and hold public corporations accountable for their assault on the family.

What do home improvement supplies, coffee, and cereal have to do with the gay marriage debate? Although at first glance the answer would be nothing, there is a strong connection. General Mills, one of the world's largest food companies, has weighed in on the gay marriage debate, joining Home Depot and Starbucks, among other powerful companies, in support of redefining marriage.

The National Organization for Marriage, a non-profit group that advocates for the protection of traditional marriage, has gathered over 20,000 signatures on its petition against General Mills' public opposition to the marriage amendment in Minnesota this November, which would define marriage as between one man and one woman. Those who signed the petition,Dump General Mills, vowed to boycott the company's products over its position on the marriage issue.

... NOM had previously led a similar campaign against Starbucks that has to date over 45,000 signatures. And last year, the American Family Association rallied over half a million people to commit to boycotting Home Depot over its support of homosexual activism.

Voters in The North Star State will have a chance in November to vote on a proposed constitutional amendment that would bar anything other than traditional marriage. Jonathan Baker, a spokesman for NOM, explains why the boycott of General Mills has become necessary.

... "We started DumpGeneralMills.com, working on the website," Baker details. "It is live now, and it gives folks a chance to come together with other like-minded individuals and tell General Mills that we don't appreciate their stance."

The website also provides a list of all of the products General Mills puts on the market. NOM hopes to help shoppers decide whether they will continue to purchase them.

Bernardine writes to the StarTribune about why she is choosing to protest General Mills:

"Recently, I was one of the many protesters outside the General Mills corporate offices and spoke to the company's vice president of communications. I asked why a company like his would ever come out with a statement against the marriage amendment. His response was that the issue had been thought about for some time. My view is that when the media asked the company to state its position on this issue quite often, then monthly, then weekly, the company succumbed to the pressure and made this uninformed statement.

... So many people in this democracy believe in the strong foundation of a marriage between a man and a woman; it is incomprehensible that a large company that markets many of its products to children would choose this position.

A company should be interested in a good product and sales. It can make all the cereals and products it wants, but if there are no buyers, it will fail. General Mills, please choose mother, father, children in the future."

More coverage of the first protest on Monday outside General Mills HQ in Golden Vally by Minnesota Public Radio:

About fifty people protested outside of General Mills headquarters in Golden Valley today to speak out against the company's opposition to the proposed constitutional amendment that would ban same-sex marriage in Minnesota. Chuck Darrell, with the group Minnesota for Marriage, said he believes General Mills should stay out of the debate.

"The purpose of the rally is to send a message to General Mills and all Minnesota companies that marriage matters to a majority of Minnesotans," Darrell said.

The group will be holding similar protests each of the next three days. Organizers asking supporters to deliver their General Mills products to a local food shelf.
John Ruiter from Edgerton, Minnesota drove two hours to attend the protest. He said he's no longer buying General Mills products.

"Here's a huge corporation that's making a statement that's actually favoring a minority of people," Ruiter said. "The majority of the people that do business with General Mills, and they are families, with children. As far as I'm concerned, we won't buy any of their products anymore."

Earlier this month General Mills came out in opposition to Minnesota's marriage amendment ballot measure. Now supporters of the proposed amendment have launched a boycott of General Mills, imploring consumers to dump their Cheerios, Yoplait, and the myriad other products the Golden Valley manufacturer makes and markets.

The National Organization for Marriage said Tuesday, June 26, that it is initiating a protest of General Mills and has launched a website with an online petition in response to General Mills taking a public position on the amendment, which seeks to preserve Minnesota law that defines marriage as the union of a man and a woman.

The website, dumpgeneralmills.com, said it had gathered more than 8,000 signatures by Tuesday evening.

"We'd like (General Mills) to step back and say they respect the views of all of their customers and employees," said Jonathan Baker, director of the Corporate Fairness Project for the National Organization for Marriage. "Eating Cheerios for breakfast shouldn't have to be a moral choice about marriage."

General Mills has lost 10,000 customers in less than two days. If we keep this up, somebody intelligent will look at the numbers and realize that endorsing same-sex marriage legislation, entering the Culture War and affronting the values and beliefs of millions of your customers is just bad business.

We MUST keep the pressure on General Mills, Starbucks and the rest of Corporate America. The MUST get the message that it's not OK to flout the core values and beliefs of millions of Americans by siding with social activists who want to redefine marriage for everyone.

The decision by General Mills to publicly oppose a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage drew fire from a group supporting the amendment.

The "Minnesota for Marriage" group organized a protest outside the company headquarters in Golden Valley. The protest drew about 50-75 protesters, some of whom brought General Mills products like Cheerios to drop off for a food bank rather than consume them.

"They feel betrayed that a company like General Mills has spent millions, if not billions, of dollars marketing cereal to parents of children who suddenly now say marriage needs to be redefined," says Chuck Darrell of Minnesota for Marriage.

General Mills CEO Ken Powell announced the company position on the amendment on June 13. Today, company vice president Tom Forsythe had coffee and water delivered to the protesters as a gesture of goodwill. "We understand your point of view," Forsythe told the protesters. "We acknowledge it. We respect your right to disagree with ours."

Minnesota for Marriage isn't organizing a boycott of General Mills, but the "National Organization for Marriage" is promoting one. They've also created a new website called dumpgeneralmills.com.

"In declaring a war on marriage, General Mills is declaring war on their own customers." —Brian Brown, President of NOM—

Washington, D.C.—The National Organization for Marriage (NOM) today announced that they will be initiating a protest of General Mills, including a new website at www.DumpGeneralMills.com, in response to General Mill's announcement that they, as a corporation, support same-sex marriage.

"In declaring a war on marriage, General Mills is declaring war on their own customers. Now, rather than seeing the flowing "G" trademark as a symbol of General Mills, consumers across the world will equate that symbol with gay marriage," said Brian Brown, NOM's president. "For a company that reaps billions of dollars of sales from families with children this is a spectacularly foolish decision. It goes to show what happens when a company puts special political interest groups ahead of their business interests."

On their website, General Mills makes the commitment to respect diversity. Not just diversity of things like gender, skin color, or sexual orientation, but also respecting diverse values, preferences, and beliefs. This protest will be designed to hold General Mills accountable to that promise.

In addition to well-known General Mills products like Cheerios, Kix, and Wheaties, the boycott will also include brands that many consumers might have thought stood alone—brands like Pillsbury, Yoplait, Betty Crocker, Bisquik, Green Giant and more. A full list for interested shoppers can be viewed at: www.DumpGeneralMills.com.

###

To schedule an interview with Brian Brown, President of the National Organization for Marriage, or Jonathan Baker, Director of NOM's Corporate Fairness Project, please contact Elizabeth Ray (x130), [email protected], or Jen Campbell, [email protected], at703-683-5004.

The CEO of a major cereal company has expressed his opposition to the Minnesota marriage amendment at a business function centered on LGBT professionals. One traditional marriage supporter called the move a PR stunt.

General Mills CEO Ken Powell declared his opposition last week to the amendment that if approved by voters would be added to the constitution of the state where his company is headquartered. In response, Jonathan Baker, director of the Corporate Fairness Project at the National Organization for Marriage, told The Christian Post that General Mills' position was "one of the dumbest PR stunts I have ever seen."

"The proper business decision is to stay neutral so as to respect the diverse views of your employees, customers, communities in which you operate, and, for publicly traded companies, your shareholders," said Baker.

Learn more about our newly-announced Dump General Mills campaign right here.